I recently encountered a problem with my Raptor that you might run across someday. I started getting noises from the transmission area and about died. All I could think of is loosing 2nd gear like I have hearing about on the forums. After running it on jack stands, I finally tracked the noise down to the front sprocket area. I found that the bearing in the lower chain tension roller had come apart and was making the clanking, clunking noise and the roller was eaten up pretty bad. Of course, Yamaha did not have one and the after market ones are smaller in diameter. They said about 10 days to get a roller and bearing. In the mean time, I checked the top one and it was frozen up . I put the top on the bottom and vice versa. The best part is that since they had to order the bearing also, I began to look through my junk draws and found some sealed bearings from some in-line skates. They fit the roller perfectly so I replaced the bearing in both rollers and they worked perfect. Noise is gone. When the new roller comes in, I will not buy the Yamaha bearings and go with the roller blade bearings.

 

Cool! thanks for the info!